Dow falls nearly 1,000 points on rate hike fears and poor earnings from Verizon

New York (CNN Business) Stocks plunged Friday.

The Dow fell about 980 points, or 2.8%, following comments about likely aggressive interest rate hikes from Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell. A poor earnings outlook from Dow component Verizon didn't help matters.

Verizon VZ Caterpillar CAT American Express AXP All 30 stocks in the Dow ended the day lower, led by, which fell more than 5.5%, and, which plunged 6.5%. Dow componentwas off nearly 3% in response to its latest earnings. Stocks finished near their lows of the day. The Dow was down as much as 1,019 points heading into the close.

The S&P 500 and Nasdaq each dropped more than 2.5%, too. All three indexes were in the red for the week, with the Nasdaq sliding almost 4% in the past five days. The Dow has now fallen for four straight weeks while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq have declined for the past three weeks.

Powell confirmed what many bond investors already suspected...that a half-point interest rate hike is "on the table" for the Fed's next meeting in May. The yield on the 10-year Treasury bond has spiked to 2.9% in recent days...the highest level since December 2018.